Archive | On the Rocks

My partner’s flop had been broken into and his 8-horsepower Yamaha outboard and a propane heater boosted. In his neighborhood, the only surprise was that it hadn’t happened sooner. All the same, we’re talking about a guy with a vindictive streak as wide as the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and he wasn’t going to […]

“Dylan, do we need to call the Coastguard?” Me- “Maybe…Give me a minute. You have your life jacket on? Good. Can you keep an eye on things up here? I need to go down below.” Rebecca- “Yes, but hurry. I don’t Like this!” This was a brief excerpt from a conversation that no one wants […]

In a sad coda to this 2012 story, Mercer Island man Richard Sweezy’s body has been recovered more than two years after his boat drifted ashore in Kirkland, empty but with a portable generator still running. Sweezy’s car was located at the Queen City Yacht Club in Portage Bay, where his boat was kept. Foul […]

Is there some sort of magnet drawing together 16-foot sailboats and nasty weather up in the islands lately? On the heels of the solo sailor rescued by the Coast Guard and East Jefferson Fire-Rescue on Sunday (covered here by the Peninsula Daily News), another sailor was rescued during yesterday’s windstorm near Anacortes by the crew […]

A Coast Guard helicopter hoisted a single-handed sailor to safety on Monday night in Bellingham Bay. Thirty knot winds, 6-foot seas and heavy rain complicated the rescue effort, which can be seen in part in the Coast Guard video below. The Coast Guard received two reports from family members of the sailor, who had contacted […]

A 32-foot sailboat en route from Hawaii to Everett became disabled approximately 800 miles off the California/Oregon coast last night and activated an EPIRB, summoning assistance from the Coast Guard and the Automated Mutual-Assistance Vessel Rescue (AMVER) system. This morning, the 965-foot container ship Hyundai Grace reached the sailing vessel Hale’s Revenge in deteriorating conditions […]

The body of an Olympia man who went missing yesterday afternoon after the sailboat he was on capsized during the Eagle Island Race in Budd Inlet has been recovered, ending an intensive overnight search and rescue effort. The man’s body was found Sunday afternoon near the Herron Island ferry dock. Jay Bergland, 46, went missing […]